Stories from Wednesday, August 12, 2015

A thunderstorm bringing lighting and high winds triggered five range fires across southwestern Idaho, including two in the local area. The Beeter Fire burned approximately three acres of land about seven miles southeast of Mountain Home off Beet Dump Road...

Hundreds of people made the annual trek to Mountain Home to relive the culture and language of the Basque people during a yearly celebration held in a small park on the city's west side. The 55th Annual Basque Picnic on Saturday is often the one day out of the year where these people can get together and enjoy a special friendship forged by tradition...

by Tim Bondy Mountain Home News The completion of two large-scale projects in Mountain Home over the past year will cause the city's new operating budget to fall by $1.1 million, but the $20 million spending plan will cover a number of projects when it takes effect...

A county music festival that doubled Mountain Home's population over a four-day period had a positive impact on Elmore County's economy, according to preliminary findings from businesses across the county. The Mountain Home Country Music Festival, which wrapped up Aug. 2, represented a very successful first year for concert organizers and local retailers, said Bonnie Layton executive director for Southwest Idaho rural development...

Dear editor, The Society of St. Vincent de Paul would like to thank the community for another successful year of the Summer Feeding Program Picnic in the Park. More than 8,000 free lunches were served to hungry children in the Mountain Home community this summer...

Dear editor, What a wonderful community we live in. Today, the last of the free summer lunches were served, which have fed hundreds of hungry children over the course of the summer at different locations, and free school supplies or supply vouchers were handed out as well...

High winds from a thunderstorm Tuesday evening triggered a large-scale power outage that affected thousands of people in Mountain Home and surrounding communities. The storm, which stretched across western Elmore County and southeastern Ada and Canyon counties, caused tree limbs to fall on two electrical feeder lines near Mountain Home, triggering an outage around 5 p.m., said Idaho Power spokesperson Julie Stutts.